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Wine Vocab and Pairings

Since the first wine was served people have been working to find the perfect complement to their favorite wines, and have been obnoxiously verbose about it. Now, it’s your turn.

There are some general rules for wine pairings. Those are:

white wines go with lighter foods.

red wines go with steaks, or heavy food.

champagne goes with everything – Champagne has sweet overtones that work well with a variety of foods.

Hard cheese goes with bigger more robust reds, while soft cheese goes well with white

One important thing to note is that there are no hard and fast rules and the first step to knowing wine is acting like you know wine. If you are interested in sounding like you know what you’re talking about use these words used to describe wine.

Acidic – Whites tend to taste acidic, which pairs well with seafood.

Bright – A more descriptive way to say acidic.

Charcoal – it tastes like charcoal

Complex – A complex wine is different from the moment you taste it to the moment you swallow it. (Extra Credit: describe how it’s complex)

Crisp – A simple wine, the opposite of complex.

Earthy – The way classy people say there is a terrible aftertaste.

Flamboyant – This wine is fruity.

Hint of – Use this if you want you taste something but you don’t want to explicitly say the wine taste like that.

Oaked – This means that the wine, white or red, has an oakey flavor because it was likely aged in an oak barrel, say this and rejoice when the sommelier says it was aged in an oak barrel.

Structured – Another nice way to say this wine is terrible.

The last and perhaps most important way to talk about particular wines is to talk about their grapes. Here are a few phrases to awkwardly mention in conversations about wine.

Merlot is an early ripening grape.

Cabernet Sauvignon became well known for its prominent use in bordeaux blends.

Chardonnay is one of the three major grape varieties used to make champagne.